Location systems for locating objects or personnel within a facility and their use in conjunction with telephone systems have previously been proposed. Typically, location systems locate personnel or objects by seeking out where the objects or personnel are closest to designated monitors, using portable units worn or attached to objects or personnel to be located. Each portable unit is assigned a unique identification. Location systems employing such location techniques are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,515,426 to Yacenda et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 5,465,082 to Chaco. In addition, such prior art location systems have also been combined with telephone systems for facilitating location of and communications between personnel in a facility.
Scheduling systems distributed among a plurality of users have heretofore been limited to wired networks between generally fixed location terminals, such as the system described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,626,836 to Curtis et al.
The use of scheduling systems in conjunction with locator systems has heretofore usually been in the form of providing scheduling features which allow scheduling information to be centrally stored and sent to respective users; for example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,493,692 to Theimer et al. provides a locator system with badges and other portable devices which allow a user to be located as well as to schedule events.
Such schedule and locator systems have heretofore delivered messages or schedule information to users with little or no security; for example, the prior art schedule and locator systems may purposely select an available device in the proximity of the recipient with little or no control of the recipient.
Therefore, a need exists for a scheduling and locator system with improved processing of messages to the appropriate recipients and with greater control of reception by the recipient.
Further, mobile wireless devices of the prior art have either been rudimentary input devices or have been limited in features. Recent improvements and developments in user interfaces have not been adapted in such scheduling and locator systems to provide ease of use in conjunction with greater functionality.
Therefore, a need exists for a telephone/locator system which provides advanced features with an improved user interface to address the above problems and to facilitate interaction and control of the system by the users.